


Black Liquorice

by Prongsyouignoramus (ItUnscrewsTheOtherWay)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-19
Updated: 2016-05-30
Packaged: 2018-06-03 06:21:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 12,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6600181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ItUnscrewsTheOtherWay/pseuds/Prongsyouignoramus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being separated from Severus on the first day of Secondary school is not ideal, but Lily manages. Its surprisingly easy to make friends with the other students of 7Gryff, although she's not sure about that runty kid called Potter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Stolen Sparkly Gel Pens

**Author's Note:**

> A humongous thanks to firagaproductions for literally everything, this fic wouldnt be up without you, and to tamilprongspotter for steering me in the right direction.  
> Ive drawn an illustration for each chapter, which you can check out at prongsyouignoramus on tumblr

She first meets James on the second day of year 7. She spins around to see his hair falling over dark eyes and his glasses sliding down his nose, because she always gesticulates wildly when excited, and she has just elbowed him hard in the face. Her mouth opens to say sorry, but Sev speaks first, to marvel at how “someone like him could get into a school like this”. James, who has till this point been smiling, now scowls. Any apologies are useless with him marching away, pushing now bent spectacles back up the bridge of his nose. The next day finds Sev dangling from the fence of the netball court, and Lily resolving to stay the hell away from the dark boy with wonky glasses.

She and Sev have gotten in on scholarship. The private school fees are way too high for two kids from Cokeworth. It is natural to be wary of the others, who don’t have secondhand blazers and DIY haircuts, who speak in the “Queen’s English” and wrinkle their noses at her spam sandwiches. Though to be fair, not everyone is like that. There is narrow, large-nosed Remus who speaks with a soft Welsh lilt, and Marlene, with her jet black curls who cuts her own fringe in the girl’s loo while Lily watches in fascination. And James, who comes in every day with tupperware filled with yellow rice and red lentils and dark spinach, and foil-wrapped round flat bread.

It is impossible to remain with Sev all the time, with them being placed in separate classes. So she partners with Dorcas in English, because she has the same Woolworth’s flowery ring binder. With Marlene in Science and Maths, because Lily lets her borrow a protractor and Marlene proclaims herself forever indebted. Peter shares his crayolas in Geography so she can colour the world map printout in magenta and turquoise, and she offers a sparkly gel pen in return so he can outline Great Britain. James nicks it from him and uses up half the ink shading in India.

One day in late December, Sirius brings in two whole bags of black licorice. Lily’s class of 7Gryff spends the whole lunchtime competing to see who can eat a whole lace the fastest. Peter is a close contender, but he keeps biting them off by accident. James hasn’t actually tried it before, and spits his out immediately. Sirius himself gets a little distracted and instead tries to see how many he can fit in his nostrils (three in each). Lily wins, but she refuses to touch another piece of licorice the whole of the rest of the term.

Her afternoons with Sev at the park are hijacked by Mary MacDonald, and then by Remus, both of whom live only a train stop away. Once Remus shows them how to turn a blade of grass into a whistle. It takes a couple of tries and Remus’s gentle encouragement to manage it, but Lily does, and excitedly stores the knowledge away to show Petunia. Sev gives up and shreds his stalk of grass pretty quickly, shrugging off Lily when she tries to help. He stops coming to the park after a few weeks, saying his dad wants him at home. Afternoons seem a little lonelier after that.

Severus has told her before, about his dad and his black moods and heavy fists. Always by accident, and he will always clam up tight about his home life afterwards, as if by ignoring it, Lily will forget what he has let slip. So she takes his word for it, about needing to take an earlier train without her. About needing to do his homework at lunch instead of home, so would she go eat somewhere else? He needs to concentrate. She doesn't want to scare him into avoiding her. Not now that they only see each other for minutes at a time, when once they would spend every hour they could in each others company.

A rainy day in June sees Lily traipsing around the concrete building trying to find Sev, who hasn’t talked to her much at all the whole week and now it is Friday, and she has an article on supercars that she wants to show him. The library, his form room, and the canteen all yield empty. He isn’t even in the science labs, where Slughorn sometimes let him take over and experiment in. Instead, Lily finds him in the PE changing rooms, hanging with the awful bullies from Year 9, and “Beer?! Sev? You’re twelve years old...You said yourself you don’t wanna end up like-”

The resulting argument puts a wedge between Lily and Severus for most of the summer. He is being even more stubborn than Potter, shutting her out or flat out yelling at her and oh, it makes her seethe with anger. Hasn't she always been there for him? Can’t he see he is acting just like his father?

“Probably in denial” is Dorcas’s response, before she blows the biggest bubble either of them have ever seen, and they lament the fact that they have no camera to document it.

In the last few weeks before the end of the school year, 7Gryff’s teacher, McGonagall, sets them a challenge to plan a business. In groups of five, they write up proposals, with a design for a product, costings written and advertisement in the form of permanent marker on sugar paper. Lily is put with Potter, Anne Goldstein, Sirius and Peter. Figures that her actual friends end up with Remus - the only one of Potter’s friends she can stand.

Surprisingly, Peter turns out to be brilliant with the art supplies and, along with Goldstein, draws up all of the half arsed ideas Lily brainstorms. Sirius is the laziest deadweight she has ever come across, but she knows he is smart. With the threat of disembowelment hanging over his head, Sirius gets to work crunching the numbers. Potter is the one who suggests selling his mother’s laddoos and brings in the recipe for them . With Mcgonagall’s blessing they spend one Wednesday morning covered in gram flour and ghee in the school kitchens. They emerge with thirty four slightly wonky looking sweets to share with the class.

They don’t win. Marlene and her handmade bracelets beat them out. But with the way that everyone inhales the laddoos, and McGonagall’s seal of approval on the proposal, Lily reckons they did pretty good. Her teammates certainly agree, and they all celebrate with half melted chocolate Peter finds in his pocket. Severus refuses the laddoo she offers him. Lily says nothing, and later breaks it in half and shares it with Remus instead. 

On the last day before summer hols, everyone is allowed to wear their own clothes. Lily spends the night before deliberating over outfits. Mum says she can’t borrow Petunia’s platforms, but she can wear the scarlet maxi dress her mother hates and Lily loves, on account of how it clashes with her hair. Lily knows she looks ridiculous, wearing a large yellow floppy sunhat she stole off of Dorcas, with two braids sticking out from underneath because it is too hot to have her hair down. But James says her dress is cool, and Severus smiles when he sees her.

Lily isn’t looking forward to the summer all that much, because Petunia is going on a school trip to France and won’t be home. Marlene and Dorcas live too far away to come over all that often, and Severus… Anyway, it’s not all that bad because she has a new record player and, with much cajoling, has Dad three quarters of the way to liking David Bowie. Her mum is still running ragged as usual, because parents don’t get a summer holiday. But one Saturday, she helps Lily paint her bedroom walls bright yellow so that, come winter, her room will still be filled with sunlight.

About three weeks into the break, Lily and her Dad go further up into London to see the new Robin Hood. It’s not as good as the Aristocats, and the kid sitting behind her keeps kicking her seat, but Maid Marion is wicked and Lily might have a small crush on Robin. After, Dad goes to get sandwiches for lunch and she waits in the Odeon, and comes across two boys with shaggy dark hair trying to sneak in to see The Exorcist. Rolling her eyes, Lily proceeds to distract the ticket officer by tripping over and sprawling to the ground near her feet. As the woman helps her up, Lily catches sight of Sirius hiding a smirk and James’s impressed grin, before they disappear into the screening rooms. 

Lily makes a wobbly, rather lopsided trifle for Petunia when she comes back home, because Petunia loves trifle more than even chocolate cake. It’s an apology, for whatever it was that made Tuney feel like she couldn’t be Lily’s sister the way she used to be. For once, Petunia doesn't say anything about its less than stellar appearance. Her lips pull up into a small smile and she takes a careful spoonful into her mouth. Places the spoon onto the table. Seems to hesitate. Then scoops up whipped cream with two fingers and smears it onto Lily's face. The ensuing food fight manages to get jelly and sponge fingers stuck to the ceiling. Lily can't remember the last time she heard Petunia laugh so loudly.


	2. 12 foolproof makeup tips

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic was going to be a simple jily fluff thing but my brain wont let me do that so enjoy this longwinded mess of a story.

Marlene has apparently been on a daredevil kick the whole summer. The first Thursday back, she and Lily climb up onto the perimeter fence and try to tightrope walk across. Marlene manages to get about halfway before she wobbles dangerously and hastily clambers down. Lily calls her a sissy and manages three quarters of the way until the fence shudders violently and she tumbles sideways. James makes her an ‘I’m sorry for accidentally shoving you off a fence” card and signs the cast on her leg with crimson marker. Sev signs the cast too, scrawling his message in green and partially obscuring James’s.

It’s while Lily is still on crutches, and is unable to escape because she is hobbling, that Sev manages to corner her and apologises for being an idiot. Lily smacks him in the shoulder and then links arms with him and forces him to have lunch with her for the first time since July. Sirius joins them for about five minutes, straddling a chair backwards and staring warily at Severus the whole while. Soon after he leaves, Remus walks past and manages to trip up and dump a tray piled with his lunch tables’ dirty plates right on top of Sev. 

Sirius starts hanging around Lily pretty frequently after this. He claims that he is just bored because James has abandoned him by joining the football team. But Lily notices he only ever comes over when Sev is there for him to annoy and antagonise. Sev tenses up whenever Sirius slings an arm around him, so Sirius makes sure to do as much PDA as humanly possible to unnerve him further. Lily would be mad at him, except it’s sorta funny how irritated Sev gets, and Sirius is hilarious when he’s not trying to be an arse.

One afternoon, Petunia arrives home a little later than usual and proceeds to shut herself in the bathroom for the next hour. When Lily asks her what she’s doing, Petunia tells her to piss off. However, Lily is both very stubborn and very persistent. The door opens and reveals Petunia with blushed cheeks, something shiny smeared on her lips and wobbly black liner on her upper lid. The countertop next to her is covered with damp crumpled tissues. Lily promises not to tell Mum, and then finds the issue of ‘Teen’ Marlene lent her with “12 foolproof makeup tips” on page nine.

Sisterly affection that has been absent for a couple years starts to slowly return, enough that Petunia lets her meet the boy she has been learning makeup to impress. Lily thinks he is sort of stiff and lanky in the same weird way Potter is. Except even Potter isn't this insufferable. William spends the whole time making snide remarks about Petunia's looks, and Tuney doesn't even seem to notice. Then he pinches the bum of the waitress serving them, and Lily slaps him across the face. Petunia shrieks at her to leave and Lily storms out of the cafe, trying to ignore the apologies Petunia is giving to the wanker. 

Much to Lily’s relief, Sev has stopped knocking about with Mulciber and his lot. Instead, he seems to have taken some little year seven under his wing. It takes Lily an embarrassingly long time to connect the runty Regulus to his larger than life older brother. And then it becomes abundantly clear why Sev is so interested in Regulus, because Sirius never fails to fall sullen and quiet when he sees the company his sibling is keeping. Dorcas watches each exchange like a hawk because “Lily, they are so dramatic! This is better comedy than Faulty Towers”.

Dorcas goes on a diet on the first of March, resolving to eat no unnatural sugars and to go jogging every day before school. Lily is skeptical but supportive. Marlene pulls out some Walkers crisps and loudly opens the bag. Dorcas coerces Lily into running with her, but switches it to after school because Lily refuses to wake up before six am. On the fourth of March, Lily’s limbs are stiff and sore from exercise that is not usually inflicted upon them. Marlene comes in with three chocolate drizzled donuts and eats one slowly, chocolate smearing on the corner of her mouth. Lily and Dorcas grab one each and wolf it down in seconds.

Obnoxiously parading his new role, James starts carrying around his equipment whenever he can get away with it. Maroon polo peeking out from under his untucked shirt, muddy football cleats instead of school mandated black buckle. He spends an entire Thursday with an honest to god grass-stained football under his arm, kicking it through the hallways when no teachers are around to see it. To Lily’s chagrin, Slughorn catches him knocking it into some year sevens and instead of giving him a warning, happily starts chatting about some Manchester United player he knows personally. 

Lily spends more and more time at Dorcas’s or Sev’s houses, trying to avoid getting under Petunia’s feet in her own home. Sev’s room is small like hers, although less cozy. Lily doesn’t mind, simply dragging the blankets off his bed so they can sprawl out on the floor. Sometimes they talk, or more often these days, read aloud to each other. They’re halfway through Fellowship of the Ring when something glass shatters in the next room over. Sev goes deathly white. It doesn’t register to Lily what’s happening until Sev is helping her clamber down the drainpipe outside his window, and this is all so ridiculous, like something out of a story. Except stories don’t usually make her feel so disorientated. She can’t help but overhear a sick thud that sounds like something out of those gory slasher flicks she and Marlene watch to laugh at.

Mary MacDonald and Jacob Price are the first Year 8s to start dating. It’s amazing how suddenly Jacob’s hair goes from shabby and unkempt to scruffily adorable. The lack of spontaneous gifts and behind the bike rack snogging in the lives of every other classmate becomes achingly obvious. The pair eat lunch together everyday and spend break times exchanging gum and emotionally stunted conversation. The relationship lasts thirteen days.

This summer seems hotter than the last and Lily arrives each day at school pasty white with sunscreen. Peter turns up one day with a block of ice in a bottle and the next day half the class has caught on. James goes one further. He opens up his bag and pulls out an entire blimmin’ mango. Lily half expects him to bring out a knife to cut it with, except he just peels off the top bit, bites over the flesh there and proceeds to suck up the fruit like it’s nothing out of the ordinary. Severus finds the pulpy remains inside his rucksack during fifth period. 

Remus’ father rescues two Choppers from the dump and they spend the first three weeks of Summer scrounging up parts, saving up money for bells and new tyres and borrowing books to figure out how all the pieces fit together. Peter helps them paint them, bright turquoise for Lily and silver for Remus. Lily hasn’t ridden one before. It takes her a while but eventually she gets the hang of not wobbling and turning slow wide arcs, then sharp corners. One day James and Sirius turn up astride a tandem, looking like the biggest pair of dorks Lily has ever seen. They race her up the length of Remus’s street and then Sirius swaps her so that she can attempt the tandem. She is terrible at it, and James has to pull more than his own weight, but they manage to make it up the drive and she considers that a win.

Petunia and Lily don’t talk unless Mum is around to enforce conversation. Until Petunia stops seeing that idiot William, Lily refuses to. Which means whenever Lily is not sponging off of Dorcas or Remus she can be found in her room, avoiding all blonde haired skinny fifteen year old females (and their boyfriends) in the vicinity. Once, when both Mum and Dad are at work, strange sounds emerge through the wall from Petunia’s room… almost like moaning-? Lily drags her record player out, blasts Led Zeppelin and sings along at the top of her lungs, until all she can hear is the bass line, and all she can think about is stairway to heaven.

It’s a Saturday and Dorcas supplies chocolate and camping gear and Marlene arrives with fizzy drinks, a pick n mix bag of sweets, and extra blankets. Lily has found a proper wicker basket to keep all the food in and she is practically fizzing herself with how excited she is. They pitch up in Dorcas’ garden with a checkered blanket spread over the ground and pillows piled high. Later, when the sky clouds over and proves the weatherman wrong, the three of them scramble to collect the surplus of food and blankets before the light drizzle turns into a heavy downpour.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did accompanying art for this piece on my tumblr @prongsyouignoramus


	3. Carbonated Purple Bubbles

Over the summer, Petunia outgrows her uniform, and any pieces that are generic enough to fit at any school get shunted into Lily’s wardrobe. Wielding a pair of fabric scissors, Lily shears several inches off the bottom of each pleated grey skirt. She keeps the offcuts for Marlene, who subsequently produces a very ugly alice band. Lily assures her it looks lovely. The band goes mysteriously missing during the first PE lesson of the new school year.

Lily finds herself the centre of Sev’s attention again for the first time since they were in primary. Neither of them say anything, but both are keenly aware that the others’ house is off limits. So instead they hole up in the local library, or at the park. They spend an awful lot of time at the park. Lily wonders when the wide space she remembers, with its castles and towering trees, became a rickety too small climbing frame in the middle of a threadbare field. They clamber atop said rickety frame every other day after school and usually take out their books with the intent to quiz each other. Inevitably, the books end up discarded and the two of them will end up chattering about inane things, like the way their chemistry teacher’s moustache makes him look like a walrus. 

At school they’ve taken to eating lunch in the labs, despite the rules about food consumption in rooms that come into contact with highly corrosive acid, for lack of better options. James and his friends eat in the canteen and Sev refuses to go near them, so that’s out. And then it seems the rest of the school is literally crawling with the bullies that Sev briefly counted as friends. Dorcas seems uncomfortable with the new arrangement, and Marlene is outright angry, but Lily figures she sees them in practically every lesson, and Sev was her friend first so they would just have to deal with it. Regulus shadows them, and Lily is amused when she sees how hard he tries to be Sirius’ opposite. He shares some black liquorice with her and she wonders why siblings are so stupid. 

This year 9Gryff has been mixed with the other houses for lessons and Lily finally shares a couple classes with Sev. Lily’s new Drama class seems to be half filled with her old one - James, Sirius, Remus and Peter are all in it with her, as well as Marlene. The four boys waste time terrorising the trainee teacher by repeatedly nicking the bejewelled cane and trilby hat he uses for effect. Lily is torn between aggravation at the lesson being interrupted and glee that smarmy Mr Lockhart is getting torn down a peg. Mcgonagall evidently hears about it, and spends an afternoon registration whisper-yelling at them to “QUIT YOUR MARAUDING” while the others pretend to do some private study. Potter glances over as they are being reprimanded, catching Lily watching the proceedings. He winks at her and she grins and “Mr. Potter, you look at me when I am addressing you”.

The name sticks. Peter makes badges. Sirius refuses to wear his and james pins it along with his own onto the two points of his collar. Remus grudgingly attaches one to his satchel bag. Sev thinks it’s ridiculous and childish, and Lily can see his point after James finishes three consecutive pranks by announcing “YOU’VE BEEN MARAUDERED”. James walks around an entire Tuesday with ‘marauNerd’ in cursive pinned to his back, courtesy of Dorcas Meadows.

There is something entirely ridiculous about the amount of Dandelion and Burdock Corona Lily and her dad go through in a week. Mum prefers ‘the beer over this caffeinated rubbish you two drink’, but that just means more for the two of them. They sit together on the ugly, bogey green sofa in the living room, watching Doctor Who and sharing a bottle between them. Petunia thinks the drink will rot her teeth and prefers Troughton (the previous Doctor) to Pertwee so refuses to watch the newer episodes. Lily likes how sometimes the carbonated bubbles seem to collect and rush through her nose in one go. She likes how when spilt, the drink turns Petunia’s perfectly pressed white blouse purple.

Lily and Sev are the appointed citizenship monitors for their respective forms, which basically means they are forced to help out at every fundraiser the school decides to throw. This finds them spending a whole week of lunchtimes in a row going round school with trays of baked goods and trying to raise money for Save the Children. Peter agrees to pitch in and help, which means Remus feels guilted into helping too. Wherever Remus goes, Sirius follows like a lapdog, and eventually Lily is leading a gaggle of four over excited Marauders trying to eat the product and one sullen Severus berating them for trying to eat the product.

Marlene holds her hostage in the music rooms after Lily has spent three consecutive weeks ignoring her in favour of Severus. Lily insists she hasn’t been ignoring her, it’s just that Sev is going through a rough time and needs his friend around. Dorcas, who has been lurking by the door, snorts at this and reminds Lily that Sev doesn’t need coddling: “He purposefully set Potter’s jumper on fire in chemistry last week - he can protect himself”. Lily thinks about how she carries in her bag the exact shade of concealer needed to cover up bruising on sallow olive skin. She fixes a wry smile on her face and “Sure. You’re absolutely right. Can I go now?”

Lily gets a C on her latest English essay and spends registration tearing her hair out, pouring over the poem she was meant to be analysing, trying to make it click. Peter is sat across from her, muttering to himself. As Lily watches, he writes something down in neat script, scowls at it, and scrubs it out with a rubber. She asks him if he needs any help and finds he does. Balancing equations - simple chemistry - something that clicked in her head months ago. She helps him work through the sheet and then accepts his help in breaking down the poem. There is something calming about working with Peter. He doesn't get aggravated with her like Sev does when she needs him to repeat an explanation half a dozen times. So they start working things through together, meeting in the library after school and soon their grades start climbing.

It’s late spring, warm and cloudless, with exams around the corner for older students, although Year 9 doesn't have to worry just yet. Dorcas’ jaw is set as she tugs Lily into a private corner and takes a deep breath. It's almost like the words are wrenched from her. Lily almost laughs when she understands what Dorcas is trying to confess to. She promises not to tell Marlene the secret. This proves difficult, when every time Dorcas and Marlene so much as brush each other, Lily notices the tips of Dorcas’ ears go pink. Lily wants to punch something. She might be a little over invested in this.

There is a friendship bracelet Lily wears under her sock so that she isn’t breaking the school’s no jewellery rule. It used to be dark red but now the colour has leached out of it and it’s closer to pink. The threads around the knot are frayed and breaking, the striped pattern almost faded to nothing. Petunia has a matching one in purple, although hers is slightly lumpy, the stripes uneven and childish. It is almost pristine, but gathering dust, sitting in a box on a shelf in her room. 

Occasionally, Lily retreats up this old tree in the grounds. Being hidden by the foliage with the light filtering through is like shutting out the world. This is where she is sitting, trying to read some new book called ’The Princess Bride’, when she catches sight of Severus. She holds herself from calling out to him, watching curiously as another shock of black hair also moves into view. From her position, she is pretty sure they can’t see her, but she can certainly see them, as they hurl insults at each other. Lily can’t quite make out what it is that Sev says, but the next second James launches himself at his legs, and they end up grappling like toddlers on the floor. Eyes narrowed, Lily shakes the surrounding branches, the wilting blossoms cascading over the two idiots she calls her friends. The two of them look up, wild eyed. James, simmering with anger, storms off, leaving Sev sprawled on the floor looking sheepish.

As the summer hols start Lily finds herself for the first time wishing she was at school instead. With her parents working most of the week, it’s just her and Petunia alone and the brittle silence eats away at Lily’s patience. She is irritable and sullen and has probably gained weight with all the comfort food she’s been sneaking from the pantry. Petunia hardly eats anything at all, and mum is getting worried about her. Lily tells herself she doesn’t care, but then finds herself baking pie and leaving it on the kitchen counter, cookies and leaving a plate outside Tuney’s room. Mum and Dad end up eating the trifle Lily makes.

What with Mum getting a promotion at work, they finally get a proper house phone. Lily promptly gets into the habit of calling Dorcas and Marls almost daily, wrapping and unwrapping the coils of the cord around her arm as she talks. Marlene and her older brother go to Glastonbury together. When she comes back Lily has the landline glued to her ear for over an hour, listening raptly as Marlene gushes about her experience. She gets banned from using it for an entire week after the bill climbs too high.

Remus stays over for a couple days when his parents want to go on a weekend retreat. Mum tries to show him Lily’s baby pictures and whilst Lily is helping wash the dishes, she asks whether they have kissed yet. Mortified, Lily blusters that they have done nothing of the sort and high tails it up to her room, pausing to yank Remus up by the elbow so he follows her. It’s nearly midnight and neither of them are really asleep - simply lying in the dark, talking quietly. There is a sudden thunk against her window and when Lily yanks back her curtain she finds herself staring at the bright eyes and brighter grin of James Potter. James Potter who is currently hanging off the side of her building. James Potter who must be part goat because she isn't sure how else he managed to climb up the entirely, smoothly vertical walls. 

It’s the first time she has ever snuck out, and it won’t be the last. At first she is reluctant to indulge Potter and his wheedling at her to join them. When Sirius, standing in the bushes with arms outstretched as if to break James’ inevitable fall, threatens to wake up her whole neighbourhood, Lily quickly gives in. They race their bikes to an all night chippy and order three fish and seven bags of chips between the five of them. Afterwards they go to the park and James and Lily keep lookout as Peter sprays a roaring lion onto the dark brick of the perimeter wall. Sirius and Remus return from who knows where whilst Lily is painstakingly painting out a sunflower and James is attaching a crude pair of antlers to Peter’s lion. Sirius looks a bit like he’s been electrocuted, hair sticking up at odd angles and a slack expression on his face. Remus is beaming.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Illustrations for this fic are on my tumblr prongsyouignoramus, and comments are very very much appreciated. (They are my lifeblood)


	4. Posh Bloody Teenagers

Year 10 brings with it the growth spurts of everyone but Lily. She remains five foot nothing and the heeled buckle boots she starts wearing absolutely do not compensate for anything. Sirius has shot up head and shoulders above Lily, and has taken to resting an elbow on top of her when they are standing next to each other. Both Dorcas and Remus seem to stretch out like beanpoles and James is steadily topping them all, his unkempt hair adding even further height. Lily tries to be mad about it, but then one lunch time they are all playing pictionary on the blackboard and she tries to reach the top but can’t. James all but scoops her up in his lanky brown arms to give her a boost, and amid the annoyance she is just the slightest bit exhilarated.

10Gryff spends a week in March in Paris for a languages trip. Lily hasn’t been paying attention to language lessons for four years and doesn't intend to start now. She simply enjoys the sightseeing and the shopping and Marlene’s terrible accent when she tries to order a coffee. Sirius surprises everyone when he spouts perfect French at a hawker trying to sell them dinky plastic Eiffel Towers. Obviously offended, the hawker seems to hold himself back from responding and stalks away. One of the chaperones takes Sirius by the ear and berates him for using profanities. “Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?!”  
“Ew never”

James comes in one day with a veritable rainbow of powder behind his ears and elbows and falling out of his hair. Severus makes snide comments about James ‘coming out’ and Sirius almost punches him. Later, when Sev has gone back to his own form room, Lily asks about it and James sits beside her, ruffling his hair and causing another colourful cascade. He explains how the last few days have been Holi, and he hadn't managed to wash all of the colour off when he showered. Then he sneezes and powder settles around Lily like a cloud and they burst into laughter.

Lily’s broad accent has mellowed after years with some of the poshest bloody teenagers in England, and she’s almost at home among them, at the very least more than she was at age eleven. So it comes as a bit of a shock when she finds herself being pushed around in the girls changing rooms for her council estate home address. Severus makes no mention of similar treatment, despite their identical backgrounds, so Lily keeps mum on her own issues. It doesn't take long for her to identify the ringleader - a sixth former by the name of Bella Black, who is coincidentally the cousin of Sev’s friend Regulus. Lily doesn't want to come in between the two of them, but it rubs her up the wrong way that Sev ignores the new rips in her tights and the fresh bruises on her face.

When Dorcas finds out what’s been going on she is furious at Lily for her “bloody martyr complex”. She drags her right to McGonagall and explains the situation while Lily stands, conflicted, beside her. Once McGonagall is through with it all, Lily has made an enemy of every member of the Black family bar one. Sirius declares himself her personal bodyguard and takes his self-appointed role way too seriously. Lily thinks he has taken it a bit far when Bella goes home early after a laxative gets slipped into her lunch, but Sirius vehemently denies having anything to do with it. James looks suspiciously innocent behind him. 

It’s a Tuesday and none of them want to do the Biology test so they head to the high street instead and find themselves outside a salon. They talk Marlene down from simply shaving it all off, but she still gets it cut practically to her ears, shorter than half the boys in their year. Dorcas gets her own dyed turquoise and feathered out like a movie star. There is something satisfying about seeing the swaths of red fall away until Lily’s once elbow length hair is now swinging at her chin. When they come in the next day, McGonagall promptly gives them a week’s detention. Sirius is in awe of them all and James seems compelled to ruffle Dorcas’s hair as if he can’t believe the change unless he touches it every two minutes. When Remus comes in the next Monday with half his head shaved and the remaining curls hanging over his eyes Sirius practically goes into paroxysms of joy and Lily jokes that the other marauders will have to get mohawks to beat them out.

It panics Lily a little when her parents friends and the neighbours and Mrs Cooper at the corner shop all start asking what she’s thinking about doing with her life, what with her fancy grammar school education, she could be anything! And Lily is terrified. Petunia glowers at the people who do this, not out of any loyalty to Lily, but because nobody ever asked her the same. This, Lily realises, is the rift that Petunia saw even back when she was in year 6. People think Lily is smarter than her, more promising, has more potential. And Tuney can never forgive her for that.

Dad hands her some pretty art clipping for her bedroom wall, and on the back is an article about advancements in medical science and this man called Christiaan Barnard in South Africa who transplanted an actual human heart a few years back. Lily is fascinated and takes out all the library books she can find surrounding the subject. She starts paying attention in biology and while Sirius gags when the teacher dissects a heart to show them the circulatory system, Lily is practically spellbound.

Marlene kisses James on a dare, then keeps kissing him, and the pencil Dorcas is holding is put under great pressure and comes very close to snapping in half. It doesn’t even last five minutes before they resurface, grinning good naturedly and assuring each other that “You’re great but no.” Lily is bemused when instead of smoothing down his now messed up hair, Potter ruffles it up even more. He looks like a fluffed up chicken. 

Sev buys her a flower pendant, just because. It’s made of plastic and obviously from the pound shop. Lily adores it. Sev’s mouth twists up in a smile when she tells him this. She hides it under her shirt, but when she is walking along the school corridors, Lily takes to smoothing her thumb over the petals, or hooking her fingers in the chain and pulling it taut around her neck. This proves to be a mistake when James and Sirius careen into her, knocking her forward and causing her to yank the chain, snapping it. James tries to replace it, but it sort of defeats the purpose. She didn't like the necklace because it was pretty. She liked it because she thought her childhood friend was slipping away from her, and the cheap coloured plastic proves he is not.

Petunia collapses whilst at school and the doctors in A&E say she hasn't eaten anything in two days. Lily stares numbly at her big sister in the sterile white bed, with her sharp cheekbones and her wispy hair and her refusal to look Lily in the eye. She feels like crying. Hospitals are a lot starker, and blankly impersonal, than she thought they would be. Dad changes jobs so he can work from home. It’s more hours and for less pay, but it allows him to cook for every meal and check up on his daughters more often. When Petunia comes home, she stays in her own room, only coming downstairs when Dad forces them to eat together at the kitchen table. They have to get rid of the landline again.

Lily throws herself into work at school, much to the delight of McGonagall. She figures if she does something like that Barnard fellow, then she’ll never have to get rid of the landline at home, and she could take hours long showers without needing to ration the hot water. And she could share it all with Tuney and everything would be brilliant. Sev thinks she’s being an idealist. Besides, women don’t become doctors because that takes up all your time and when you drop out to have a baby, then your career goes down the drain. “You should probably become a nurse or something instead”. Lily simply buckles down over her chemistry textbook and tries very hard to resist doing something stupid, like bursting into tears or punching Sev in the jaw. Sev can be such an idiot sometimes.

June arrives with the promise of the hottest summer since Lily was nine. Lily is drowning in sweat, melting from the heat, and Marlene commiserates. Dorcas, having spent half her childhood in the comparatively sweltering heat of Japan, is fine. James brings in a whole flask of some yellow yoghurt thing and when he notices Lily fanning herself lethargically he offers her a swig. It tastes like mango and is cool, thick and sweet. It takes all of Lily’s willpower to not down the whole bottle.

Remus ends up bedridden the week before school lets out, and when Lily visits him, she finds out the wanker has been hiding his illness from everyone but the Marauders for the four years they’d all known each other. Sirius appears to live at Remus’ house over the summer holidays, as he is parked in the desk chair every time Lily comes over. Lily expends all the frustrated energy built up by Petunia refusing her attempts at helping her, by fussing over Remus instead. 

When Remus finally can leave without coughing up a lung, the four of them, sans Peter whose parents carted him off to Disneyworld, hang out in their spot, by the lion with antlers and the sunflower Sirius had painted fangs onto and drench themselves in sunlight. Lily closes her eyes so that all she can see is the warm orange of the inside of her eyelid, her limbs spread like a starfish in the threadbare grass. Remus drapes his legs over hers and Sirius’s hair, which has grown out longer than Lily’s, tickles her neck. Her fingers catch on James’ and lying there, Lily almost feels at home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so if you wanna see the girls' haircut then you can see it on my tumblr prongsyouignoramus :D  
> Also prepare for angst in the next chapter...


	5. No Apparent Provocation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is some violence in this chapter

James is appointed captain of the A-team and he won’t shut up about it. A few idiots boycott and leave, ostensibly over James replacing the old captain Mulciber (who had been expelled in his final year for carrying a knife in his bag). But the looks of disgust are for a different reason. Marlene, Sirius and a couple others easily agree to replace the few who left until James can set up tryouts. Tryouts turn out to be unnecessary. Marlene can outstrip most of the boys, for all their annoyance at someone so ‘large and wobbly’ making the team. Sirius threatens to punch the lights out of anyone who bats an eyelid at the thought of a fat girl and a brown boy playing football.

Regulus was one of the ones who defected, and tension between him and Sirius begins to boil over. To Lily’s horror, James only exacerbates the situation, using it as an excuse to pick on Severus as well. Captainship is going to his head it seems. Immature dunderheads, all of them. Sev is still her first friend, so while she washes her hands of Potter and Sirius and the weird rivalry they have with Regulus, she still sticks with Sev. It's only right. James is put out by Lily's sudden coolness to him, but as long as he keeps putting itching powder in Sev’s clothes, she isn't going to show him any courtesy. 

For Halloween, the school introduces a dress up competition. Lily paints herself green to be the Wicked Witch from Oz and she cajoles Sev into a bat costume. It was either that or Dorothy, which he refused point blank. Dorcas and Marlene come as Sherlock and Watson respectively and McGonagall gives them both proud smiles, she herself being Moriarty. James keeps trying to steal Lily’s witch hat and it becomes more and more difficult to act angry at him. That is until she spots him dumping a can of coke over Yaxley at lunch with no apparent provocation, reminding her what a bully he can be. 

Marlene takes it upon herself to introduce the whole of 11Gryff to Queen, singing Killer Queen under her breath every chance she gets. Much to her chagrin, Lily finds herself humming along and Remus reluctantly bobs his foot along under the table to Marlene’s tabletop drumming. Sirius embraces it with pomp, apparently learning the whole of Sheer Heart Attack overnight, belting it in his tone deaf voice and getting cuffed upside the head by McGonagall for his trouble. 

Sev turns up to school sporting a black eye or bruised jaw more and more regularly, Lily carefully dabbing concealer onto his face to help him hide it. She tries to convince him to tell someone, he is still a minor, he can still be helped by child protective services. Sev refuses, saying he has Lily to protect him, why would he need anyone else? Lily feels helpless. All she can do is try to make Sev’s life a little less crap at school, lord knows he needs some place that he feels safe.

A boy from 11Raven asks her out. His name is Ollie and he has a plaster on his chin that sort of scratches at her face when he kisses her under the cover of the dark cinema. He tastes like the salt of the popcorn and he has a moptop like Paul McCartney that gets in his eyes. They become a tentative item at school, and Lily grins at her friends reactions when she tells them their first date was to see a horror movie and her first kiss was to the soundtrack of a bloody axe murder.

Ollie gets irritated when Sev repeatedly drags Lily away for study sessions or, as is more often the case, a rundown on the many shortcomings of one James Potter. Who last Wednesday melted Slughorn’s crystal pineapple jellies into yellow glue and managed to pin the blame on Danny Mathews. Who yesterday got Ellie Dant a detention by accidentally shredding her PE uniform during an elaborate prank on 11Slyth. Marlene thinks Lily is babying Sev. Dorcas, who has until this point stayed the bloody hell out of it, sides with Marlene when Lily breaks up with Ollie to spend more time with Sev.

Sev hasn’t been in school all day and Lily doesn’t even realise until his form tutor Slughorn asks if she knows anything. He emerges from the boys’ loos just before the end of lunch, and Lily manhandles him into a broom cupboard before he can escape. The small smile that surfaces when he sees Lily vanishes when she yells at him for bunking off so close to O Levels. Angry, and sort of listing to the side a bit, he interrupts Lily’s questions by insisting that he just feels sick and not up to class. He heads out of the building and towards home before Lily can stop him.

Exams are horrendous. Lily is just holding onto the promise of summer afterwards, and the ball that’s going to be held for the year elevens. Dorcas burns herself out over her french written, Marlene breaks down crying after Maths and Lily finds herself muttering physics equations under her breath to calm herself down more than once. The Marauders seem coolly impervious to the atmosphere of stress, Sirius even going so far to fall asleep during their History paper. It's all very irritating, especially when Potter finishes Chemistry early and waltzes out of the hall whilst Lily is still hurriedly drawing mechanisms. And then it’s over, and there is no more school for almost three months and Lily can bask in as much sunshine as she wants instead of staying holed up inside revising. 

The night of the ball arrives with much aplomb, the girls of 11Gryff all congregating at Marlene’s house beforehand to get ready. Dorcas finally plucked up the guts to ask Marlene out the week before, Lily can see them over by the bathroom putting eyeliner on each other between kisses. It’s all disgustingly adorable and Lily is so so happy for them. Even though now she is technically the only one out of the three going stag.

Lily is trying to teach Peter how to do The Bump when Sev appears and whisks her off to the back of the hall. Lily is giggling, her dress is tripping Sev over and it’s like everything is floating. Sev sways to the right and Lily is brought sharply back to earth. He is holding a bottle of...water? No. Away from all the body spray and perfume the smell of alcohol is settling clearly around them. Lily tries to take the bottle from Sev but he won't let go and ends up careening into her side. His face is suddenly too close and his breathing is heavy on her neck. Lily gently pushes him off her when he tries to lean closer for a kiss and Sev’s benign tipsy mood seems to turn black.

All at once Lily is on the floor and Sev is yelling, horrible words that make Lily’s stomach turn. Sev’s accusation of “Prudish Bitch” is cut off by a fist to his gut, and James Potter is tackling him to the floor. Sev’s nose is bleeding and James has a split lip and Lily can only see Red. She doesn't feel quite present, can vaguely hear a voice, her own voice, screaming at the both of them. At Sev for turning into his father, at James for yet again escalating the situation to a point where she can't control anything, let alone herself. Her feet carry her away, Marlene is hugging her tightly and Dorcas is glaring at anyone who tries to come near.

Her dress has a stain on it from where Sev’s vodka slopped over it. Somehow this small, barely visible stain in the folds of her gown is the worst thing that’s happened the whole night. Lily is standing in the loos, her rented prom dress is ruined and she feels her face crumple as tears spill down her cheeks. Lily gratefully takes the wad of tissues Dorcas hands her and tries to dab at her face without smudging her makeup. Then she says fuck it and lets her eyeliner smear where she is wiping away the snot and tears.

The three of them spend a whole week of summer trying to renovate Marlene’s room. Disassembling and reassembling the wardrobe, painting navy onto the walls and stars onto the ceiling. Dorcas, who has spent the last year with a chunky kodak camera around her neck, produces dozens of photos to tack to the walls. Lily is in roughly a third of them, a hand or hair obscuring her face, or else blurred mid laughter, arms around Marlene's shoulders. It's a far cry from the frozen coat hanger smiles adorning the living room in Lily’s house.

One weekend Lily comes downstairs to find Petunia curled up neatly on the sofa, reading a book and slowly picking at a bowl of raspberries. Lily tries to hide the joy she feels at seeing Tuney absent mindedly snacking again. Tuney is even managing to get out of the house more: coming home from the hairdressers with her hair set in an ugly perm, or from the library carrying a small mountain of books. With Mum’s help she starts job hunting and eventually lands one. From what Lily can gather she is an under-secretary at a company called Grudd.. Grunting? Grunnings? Something like that anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, illustrations are on my tumblr, prongsyouignoramus. I really hope I did canon justice here, this has been by far the hardest chapter to write. Constructive criticism is always welcome.


	6. Pre-emptive Scrabbling

Mr and Mrs Potter are sweeping around the headmaster's office on the first day of school. Rumours fly: James is being held back a year, James is going to be expelled and his rich parents are trying desperately to change Headmaster Dumbledore’s mind. The truth is just as outlandish and nothing at all to do with James. It is instead entirely to do with his longer haired and equally obnoxious counterpart Sirius who, Lily gathers, was disowned by the Blacks over the summer. The reason for The Very Mysterious Visit from the Potters was to do with them arranging to pay Sirius’ school fees, because Mr and Mrs Potter were unnaturally kind, and had taken the idiot in with open arms.

Lily asks to be partnered with someone else, anybody else, in Chemistry. Slughorn waffles about how he hates to break up the ‘Dream Team’ but something in Lily’s expression must get through his thick skull because Lily is moved next to Sirius instead. Severus tries to intercept her after class but Marlene materialises beside her and glares at him until he, muttering an apology, walks away. Dorcas and Marlene continue to act as guard dogs the whole first half term. Sev eventually gets the message and just stays away.

Remus keeps getting sick, not as bad as the one time in fourth year, but more frequently than before, and it scares Lily shitless to see him losing weight. It’s uncomfortably familiar, and Remus has to reassure her that it’s his body being useless, not his brain. Still, Lily’s mother-hen instinct takes over and she bakes whole trays of biscuits and cupcakes to force feed Remus during break and lunch. James seems to have the same idea, except his choices of snack are irritatingly healthy. Carrots and bell peppers, apples and bananas, everything looking like he’s just plucked it from a farmers market. It becomes a rivalry of sorts, Lily aggressively baking sugary goodness, and Potter conjuring a orchards worth of fresh fruit. Maddeningly, Remus likes both indiscriminately, which makes the pseudo competition they have found themselves in very difficult to judge.

On Lily’s birthday she finds unlabelled tupperware with six Laddoos nestled inside in her locker. They are dusty yellow, perfectly round and taste like goddamn heaven in a box. She spends the whole of second period Maths staring at the back of Potter’s head. A large part of her wants him to telepathically just know that she is thankful without her having to actually speak to him. A smaller, but still sizeable, part of her softens towards him and his perpetually electrocuted-looking hair. 

Dorcas buys Marlene a necklace on Valentine's day this year and Lily ruminates that after an entire summer of being happy for a couple, the second hand giddiness tends to wear off. Peter, who every year makes handmade cards for the girls in their class, ups the ante this year: Lily and Marlene help him put a singular rose and valentine into the locker of every girl in year 12, as well as the lockers of boys who wouldn’t subsequently be inclined to thump Peter in a misguided act of masculine bravado. Sirius stands on a table at lunch, cursorily flips the bird in the general direction of his brother, and (badly) serenades Remus, to looks of disgust from some and goodnatured jeering from others. Remus, who has been nursing a migraine all morning, simply rolls his eyes and smacks a kiss on his mouth to shut him up.

Petunia has been talking to a therapist at the insistence of their parents. It’s expensive, and Lily couldn’t get any new shoes to replace her beat up ones this year, but with how Petunia is improving, Lily doesn’t begrudge her anything. Lily applies to the Boots pharmacy on the high street, and gets a Saturday job running the register. It’s a lot more boring than she thought it would be, and the shiny smile she plasters on her face the first day is dropped after her fifteenth interaction with a customer. But she is now in possession of a bank account which is slowly filling with her paychecks. Lily is 17 and far more fiscally responsible than her parents ever expected her to be. Frighteningly put-together is what Sirius would call it, when he sees the bundle of university brochures in her rucksack.

Lily doesn’t feel very put together at all. There is a sense of unease she has, like she is waiting for everything to be pulled from underneath her. Her intense organisation is more accurately a preemptive scrabbling to stay standing when everything inevitably goes to shit. It takes her until April before she burns out and finds herself curled in her Dad’s lap, desperately trying to get a hold on herself when she has so much organic chemistry to try and understand and exams that will determine her future are less than a month away and she can’t do this, she can’t handle this pressure, she has a sob lodged painfully in her throat and she can’t, she can’t, she-

Slughorn offers her extra help on Organic Synthesis, and they quickly discover she has no need for it. An appointment with the school counsellor helps Lily dial down on the compulsive organisation of her future. A non-negotiable lunchtime disco that Sirius and James put on in their form room one day results in the first lunch time in a month and a half that Lily has not spent worriedly inhaling a textbook. It’s rather freeing to know that Biology can wait till the evening. She joins Marlene in rifling through the box of records Potter dragged into school, slipping the record onto the dusty school player. Lily jives to Le Freak and lets James give her a spin during the second chorus, cheeks hurting from smiling, feet in their shabby shoes tapping.

Lily used to share a room with Petunia. She used to sleep on the bottom bunk because she tossed and turned too much in the night and could’ve fallen out of the top. Petunia moved into the box room they used as storage when she was 11, because she was now a Grown Up in High School and needed her Privacy. Lily hasn’t been inside there for longer than thirty seconds for almost two years now. It is jarring, stepping in here. It is so much cleaner than the rest of the house, than how Petunia kept their shared room: the desk is empty save for a lamp and a coaster, the bed sheets tucked tightly in like Tuney was in the army. Tuney herself is on her bony knees, halfway under the bed, and she comes back out to seize the cardboard box Lily is holding, the one she brought up because Tuney is spring cleaning and she and Mum and Dad can either try and help to get it over with, or watch silently as Petunia, in her whirlwind, runs herself ragged. 

Slughorn coerces her into tutoring the younger years - the other option being running a chemistry club with Snape, and that is out of the question. So Lily finds herself trying to explain Avogadro’s Constant to a very flustered and confused fourteen year old once a week. This is what Sirius whisks her away from one Thursday, patting the yr 9 on the head patronisingly as he does so. Lily throws an apology over her shoulder, though she doesn’t feel any particular remorse for leaving the kid to tackle empirical formula alone. Sirius leads her up to the school roof, which Lily wasn’t even aware students had access to. “We don’t,” is Sirius’ reply as he pulls her through a hatch in the ceiling.

Lily can see all of the school grounds from this vantage point. It’s depressingly drab and grey. So she turns her attention back to the idiot with a pencil stuck through his ponytail. He snaps a stick of gum into his mouth and chews loudly, before launching into a very melodramatic tale of betrayal, loss and brothers. Lily knows exactly what Sirius is trying to convey in his awkward clunky rambling. So she rummages in his pocket for the pack of gum, ignoring the innuendo he immediately spews out on reflex, settles next to him and tells him about growing up in a small tiny house, with a gangly sister who always took up less room than her. How that sister would go from being her best friend to a stranger in the next room. She shows him her faded friendship bracelet and he shows her a tattoo he has hidden on his collarbone, of a tiny star. Small pieces of their siblings that they both still cling to.

Remus is hospitalised for a couple of weeks in July and Lily finds herself slumped in a plastic chair next to another Marauder for the majority of it. A cute nurse with a tattoo peeking out from her shirt collar is usually hovering in and around Remus’ ward. Lily reckons Remus has a crush on her too. Sirius and James scowl at her a lot. Lily figures Sirius is jealous, which is stupid because Remus is obviously head over heels for him. Who knows what’s going on in James’ head to make him stare daggers at the girl every time she and Lily have a conversation.

The girl, whose name turns out to be Dora, is probably the coolest person Lily has ever met. She has a secret tongue piercing, a badger tattoo on her neck and vibrant nail polish that is a different colour every time Lily sees her. Dora helps Lily get some work experience at the hospital and so Lily gets to hang out with her the whole summer. Remus, who comes in for checkups fairly frequently, teases her for being so obviously smitten. Lily cheerfully tells him to go fuck himself.

Sirius has always been Lily’s friend, but something has shifted, and every second Lily isn’t at the hospital, Sirius is planted next to her like a very possessive weed. Lily admits it’s nice having him around as it means that Snape avoids Lily like the plague all summer. Like a very annoying package deal, Sirius comes with the rest of the Marauders and Lily doesn’t think her house has enough food to feed them all. Her fears are allayed by the mountains of tupperware full of food Mrs Potter makes her two sons bring over. If Lily ever properly meets Mrs Potter she is going to hug her, because her kofta is the bloody best thing Lily has ever tasted.

The five of them cram themselves into Lily’s tiny bedroom, and as teenagers do, manage to spend hours upon hours doing nothing, feeling like time is simultaneously passing too slowly, and far far too quickly. When Petunia occasionally pries herself away from work she avoids the teenagers by shutting herself up in her room. Sometimes Petunia and one of the boys cross paths and Lily can see her lips purse despite her pointedly ignoring them. She is even more cold towards James, wrinkling her nose at his scruffy hair and swanky clothes. Lily suspects Petunia isn’t completely indifferent to James’ skin either, although it feels painful to admit to herself how small-minded and ignorant her own sister is.

Lily and Dorcas do a few Uni visits together, trying, perhaps vainly, to prepare for the coming year. The buildings are massive and full of people who may only be a year or so older, but may as well be a completely different species, with how collected and adult they appear. Lily feels about five years old, walking among them. She comes home and buries herself in her Mum’s arms and lets the future stay distant for a little while longer.


	7. Periodic Hair Ruffling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ITS THE FINAL CHAPTER, man this is the only long project ive ever finished this is so cool :D Hope you guys enjoy it. Thankyou to anyone who commented or messaged me on tumblr about it I have a feeling I wouldve given up without you guys. Particular thanks to Firaga and Ram, you are seriously the best ever.

With the start of Year 13, everyone is painfully aware of how tiny the younger students are, and how old they are themselves. Lily has outgrown her uniform, but with only a year left of school it’s pointless to buy a new set. The teachers fortunately turn a blind eye on the skirt lengths sported by the girls of Lily’s year. McGonagall even ignores the dangly swingy earrings Dorcas has decided to wear, which Lily is very jealous of because her own ears are woefully hole-free. Dorcas forces her to get them pierced after a week of dealing with Lily staring morosely at her jewellery. Lily gets little silver studs that are nothing on Dorcas’ huge hoops, but she loves them anyway. 

On an oddly warm day considering it is late October, Sirius is wailing because the rubber band he uses to tie his hair back has snapped and someone has to do something because his “neck is going to overheat and then I will die from heatstroke. Do you want my death on your hands, McKinnon? Do you?”. Lily scoffs at him and pulls him to the floor in front of her so she can braid his hair back and tie it with a spare hair band because she isn’t going to contribute to damaging his beautiful mane with rubber bands (how does that not yank half his hair out when he takes it off?) Sirius struts around the rest of the day, preening from how good his hair looks while Remus looks on fondly and James visibly restrains himself from cutting it off with scissors.

Lily’s 18th birthday falls two days after a relapse in Petunia’s health. Her parents spend the day in hospital, out of their minds with worry and Lily mopes around until Dorcas and Remus turn up at her doorstep and bundle her to the Potters, where she finally meets Mrs. “Call me Effie“ Potter. She has soft hands and thick grey hair pulled in a ropey plait down her back. Mr. Potter is rickety and wiry like his son, salt and pepper curls still sticking up all over his head. 

Effie produces a cake thick with icing (“My son told me about your sweet tooth”) and Lily spends her first afternoon as an adult with her feet propped on Sirius’ lap, eating paratha and aloo gosht and giggling when Marlene has to down a glass of milk because she can’t handle the spices. Effie offers to give Lily cooking lessons sometime and Lily doesn’t want to impose, but holy shit, yes please.

Marlene drags her and Dorcas to every football practice because if she has to suffer James yelling at her for two hours, they can deal with the freezing February winds in solidarity. This backfires as Lily and Dorcas can huddle in their winter coats under an umbrella and Marlene herself is soaked to the bone wearing a ‘thermal’ uniform which does nothing unless its intended purpose was to accentuate the wearer's jiggly bits in which case it does an excellent job. James never has any sympathy for his bedraggled teammates and Lily takes to blowing a whistle she borrows from Hooch the PE teacher whenever he is being unreasonably harsh. James’ll shut up immediately if he hears the shrill sound and Sirius jokes that Lily has him trained like a dog.

‘Damn it all’ is all Lily can think when she finds herself staring dreamily at the back of James’ head in every class they have together. It's not her fault. Over Autumn, he grew about a foot and his hair is curling round his ears and brushing his shoulders with how long it's getting and when Flitwick tried to reach the top of the blackboard and got chalk all over him for his trouble James swivelled in his seat and smiled at her. It's all terribly awful and Lily keeps daydreaming like a fool about his forearms. Seriously, who is attracted someone’s arms? There is something deeply wrong with her.

Petunia keeps going on dates with someone from her workplace and Mum insists she bring him over for dinner. Vernon (and what kind of old man name is Vernon?) turns out to be a lot bigger than Lily expected, and he sports a mustache that rivals Slughorn’s which is impressive. It’s a strained affair, Mum is putting in a lot of effort to be welcoming, but Dad is just sitting impassively, silently judging and very clearly not liking what he sees. Lily can empathise. Petunia, who hardly ever talks to any of her family, starts speaking a mile a minute, smile stretched painfully tight over her teeth. Vernon blusters through small talk about some promotion he is getting at work, chewing with his mouth open and ignoring Dad and Lily completely. Petunia doesn’t bring him round again for months.

Remus is yelling and Sirius is flushed red with anger and Lily really wishes she had a bowl of popcorn while she watches this go down. Remus is sick of Sirius’ puns, and the way Remus sometimes calls him Siri is starting to grate on Sirius’ nerves. The situation has escalated from a irritated snap to a full blown argument and 13Gryff is captivated. McGonagall puts paid to the ridiculousness within seven seconds of entering the room. Peter times it. It’s a new record. The two of them sulk almost the whole day but are back to being obnoxiously sappy by the time school lets out.

It’s lunchtime and all their friends have buggered off to who knows where. Lily is trying to get some reading done and James is sprawled over a chair next to her, eating a pear and ruffling his hair periodically, which Lily has identified as a nervous tic of his. He leans towards her a couple times, swerving to the side before he gets too close. Lily can see him in her peripheral vision gearing up to say something, but then he deflates and drags a hand through his curls again. He slumps over the desk in front of them and Lily pats his back consolingly.

Dad has been trying to make it easier on Lily, but it’s hard to divide his attention equally when one daughter is reasonably well adjusted and the other could relapse at any time and thus needs constant support. They’ve set up an afternoon a fortnight when Lily can just spend time with him alone, drinking Corona on the sofa like they used to and watching Panorama or Doctor Who. Dad lets her tuck into his side as if she was eight and not eighteen. They might nip round to the chippy beforehand and eat hot cod and chips drenched in vinegar. It makes living with Petunia much more bearable, when Lily can look forward to their afternoons.

Lily has been staring blankly at a Biology paper for twenty minutes when she hears a tap at her bedroom window. It’s Potter, again balanced without purchase, seemingly by magic. One gangly arm is wrapped over his torso, which seems to be bulging slightly. For all he has bulked up over the past year, Lily is sure his pecs can’t be that big. Sure enough, when James has clambered into her room and unzipped his jacket, it’s not muscles that are revealed, but a small ginger kitten which seems to made entirely of fluff.

Launching itself onto Lily’s bed, the kitten quickly makes itself at home whilst James explains his predicament. He is looking to co-parent the pile of orange fuzz which he found huddling under his decking. He can’t keep it at home because his Da’s allergic and Peter’s afraid of cats and Remus is a dog person so Lily is his only option and pretty please. The kitten stumbles onto Lily’s lap and nuzzles her hand as if to ask pretty please itself. Lily turns into a pile of goop, and the evening finds her pleading with her Mum to let her keep the mysteriously dry cat she claims was wandering around outside in the rain. 

Lily is waiting for Dorcas to arrive so they can walk up to the field for Marlene’s practice and James trudges up to her and drops a plastic whistle in her hand. He figured she should have one of her own. He is standing way too close and his glasses are sliding down his nose and Lily doesn’t know whether to laugh or close the couple inches and kiss him. James ducks his head just as she surges up to meet him. 

Their noses collide and it hurts and James laughs at her but she cuts him off by tilting her head and smooshing her lips against his. They are both terrible at it, it’s all wet and vaguely spicy (presumably James’s lunch) and Lily can feel the roughness of his chapped lips against hers. When they break apart James is obviously trying to contain his smile and failing miserably. They keep kissing until Dorcas arrives, clearing her throat and looking pointedly away. 

Tuney gets engaged to the piece of wet cardboard formerly known as Vernon after only six months of dating. Lily thinks it’s ridiculous, but she honestly hasn’t seen Petunia smile like that in years and is at a loss to how said wet piece of cardboard can make her happy, when Lily can’t. Lily sees Vernon’s expensive car and Petunia’s diamond ring and she tries not to judge Tuney. For all Lily knows Petunia is actually in love with him and the cushy stable middle class home is just a bonus. Lily can’t judge her. Not when the boy she has fallen head over heels for is rich enough to live in a veritable estate. Lily doesn’t really talk to Vernon all that much, with how his eyes tend to slide over her like she is an uninteresting knickknack, but from what she gathers he is a bigoted, racist pig. He and Petunia are perfect for eachother.

James is a very vocally affectionate person, Lily discovers. After listening to eighteen declarations of love over the course of two days, Lily asks James to put his money where his mouth is. If he loves her so purely and devotedly, he will have no problem eating one lace of Black Liquorice from the packet Sirius always carries in his bag. Sirius scoffs and raises the bar to half a packet. James visibly blanches. He manages a commendable five laces before going green and hurling them into a bin. Sirius eats six himself, chuckling at the nauseous look James gives him for his efforts. Lily gnaws at one absentmindedly, watching her boys bicker, feeling something warm and heavy settle in her chest. 

In time, Lily is going to go to university, and talk James’ ear off on the phone every chance she gets. She will get sick of the Marauders sprawling all over her student accommodation and she will miss them every time they heed her words and bugger off. Lily’s going to be the first in her family to get a degree, a fact that will be celebrated by all but her sister. She is going to suffer through a marriage ceremony where her cream bridesmaids dress very carefully does not clash with her stiff hair sprayed auburn updo. 

All of her years stretch out before her, almost every day spent with the stupid, scruffy love of her life and (sooner than anyone will plan for), a tiny scruffy miniature of him.


End file.
